My Father

Dearest Sister Fatima,

I wanted to get some advice on an issue that has been bothering me as of late. I know in our religion, we say that marriage is “half of our deen.” However, my experience of witnessing my parents marriage has left me scarred.

My beautiful mother went abroad to Bangladesh to get married, while she herself was raised in America. My parents are still together, Alhamdulilah, but are in what appears to be unhappy relationship. Alhamdulilah, my mother has fulfilled the requirements of being a good mother, taking care of the home, and things of that nature, but my father hasn’t treated her well. For instance, he talks down to her frequently in front of my siblings and other people. I know this has definitely affected my mother’s self-esteem over the ~30 years that they have been married. As another example, my mother will cook food in anticipation of a family dinner, and my father will come and eat dinner by himself while not taking her or the family into consideration. Every interaction between the two turns out to be my father yelling at my mother.

Every day I return home from work, I am submerged in this relationship that has gone sour, and feel lots of sympathy towards my mother, and unfortunately, am having anger inside of my heart for my father for the disrespect and even oppression that I’ve seen towards my mother. I continue to ask forgiveness from Almighty Allah to not have resentment in my heart, but unfortunately it is something that lingers due to the environment that I am in on a daily basis. I ask for verbal forgiveness, as Allah (SWT) asks us to treat our parents with respect, and to pray for them and ask for the highest place in heaven since they have raised us. However, asking our actions to be a witness to our beliefs is a different thing. I try not to say anything to him at all for fear of being disrespectful, however, I do have to make a stand if he crosses the necessary boundaries with my mother.

Now that it is time for me to get married, unfortunately, I have a secret hatred towards men, especially men of my race. Subconciously, when I meet individuals of my race, it brings back the bad memories of what went on in my household. Unfortunately, this has caused me to have a poor opinion of the opposite gender as well. However, on the otherhand, when I look at communities of other ethnicities, it appears that there is more tenderness and caring that men have to offer, versus the stoicism and the traditional, unaffectionate, super serious Bengali father that I have. I haven’t witnessed any type of love, caring, or empathy from my father, and am left utterly confused. I haven’t witnessed it in my parents marriage either.
How can I get rid of the hostility within myself and come to terms with the opposite gender and seeing goodness in them, as well as seeing goodness in men of the same race? I have tried praying about this issue, and am trying to figure out ways to restore to my psychology what is normal. Alhamdulilah, I have met lots of great men in my life (teachers, bosses, etc), but for some reason this experience has been scarring.

Any insight that you have would be beneficial.

Click here to read how Stones to Bridges helped this user!

Assalamu ‘alaykum,

It sounds like this situation is creating a lot of tension within you and your family, and I’m really sorry that you’ve had to witness what sounds to be an unhappy marriage.

I’m not surprised that you are anxious about getting married as the closest model of marriage to you has been one that doesn’t seem to be functioning well.  As your parents have been in their pattern for 30+ years, it is unlikely that you will be able to make major changes in their relationship. So where I would start first is figuring out what you imagine a happy marriage to be like by spending time with couples that have positive relationships, and/or reading relationship books.  Next, I would start looking at yourself and how you behave in relationships with your family and friends.  Your mom and dad have been your primary role models so chances are you have inherited some of the things that you like and things that you dislike about your parents.  Once you start noticing those things, you can do structured journaling to better understand yourself, you can self-reflectively make different behavior choices, and/or seek counseling to work on those parts of yourself.

As for your anger towards men, think of the hurt and pain you’ve felt by watching your father’s behavior as a bruise.  Every time that people start to behave in a way that hits that bruise, you react instinctively to protect yourself.  So it’s about healing that sore spot by using some of the techniques above, and by catching yourself in the middle of your reactions and asking yourself questions to see if your assumptions about the person in front of you are founded.  For example, in your post, you mention that it’s harder for you to see the good men among Bangali’s and easier to see it among men of other ethnicities.  So when you are at a Bangali party and are feeling the urge to roll your eyes or you feel the anger starting to rise, stop, take a breath and start asking yourself:  What did this person do that is making me angry?

Usually you’ll come up with a behavior (he stepped in front of the women to get his food) which gets linked to an assumption (he did that because he thinks less of women) which leads you to a judgement (he’s such an arrogant, self-centered person!).  If you take that apart, and focus on the behavior and try either ask the person to supply you with their intention, or do some brainstorming about alternate reasons they might have behaved that way.  In the example above, the person might say, “My blood sugar was low, and I needed to eat right away,” or “The woman I stepped in front of is my wife and she asked me to get in front her,” etc etc.  This is from a saying of giving others 40 excuses.  If you have the courage to ask in a very respectful way, you might find the answers surprise you.

As for your parents’ relationship.  Like I said, you are unlikely to change their relationship.  However, if you want to start influencing it, having allies will be helpful.  In other words, find people who your parents respect who you can ask advice from.  It’s preferable that these people know that there are issues in the relationship.  The allies can act as your advisers around issues related to your relationship with your parents.  They can also choose to start influencing your parents’ relationship.  The most important function these people can serve is helping you if you find yourself in a situation in which your family has found a potential husband for you who is not a good fit for you.

 –       Fatima FM

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Dear My Father,

Sounds like you are very open to changing your perspective, Masha’Allah, as you recognize that it is somewhat distorted due to living in the oppressive climate that you have for so long and witnessing your loved ones being hurt. That is half the battle, I would say, that recognition. Allah won’t allow your patience to go unrewarded, Insha’Allah.

The next step is to leave yourself open to the possibility of marriage, in general, and Bengali men, specifically. You may or may not find a match among this population of men, but you certainly don’t want to miss an opportunity if one comes along, as Allah is the best of planners. In this state of mind, once you meet the brother that you think you can have a symbiotic, spiritual relationship with, you’ll be open to working through whatever obstacles are in the way from your past. His attractive qualities will motivate you to shed your judgment of the negative traits you have witnessed and fallen victim to, if you can see through your fear.

Take care not to get caught in the loop of fearing the fear itself. Having these feelings are understandable, but know that you can channel them into the behavior you want, rather than the feelings becoming your behavior. I would encourage you to do as much self-awareness work as you can to move you past some of these issues and prepare you to embrace marriage by not carrying with you an aversion to men and people of your culture. Because the fact is, there are all types in every culture. We just have to persevere long enough to find what we are seeking and not let past experiences or people fog up our lenses.

 –       Fatima SY

[If you would like us to refer you to a therapist or even just want to talk to someone who cares, please feel free to email us your contact info, including city and state to info@nuryouthforum.org].